isportsweb: How Michigan State has turned into a football school

11:29 AM, July 28, 2014

Michigan State Spartans coach Mark Dantonio walks of the field with linebacker Taiwan Jones (34) after their game against the Iowa Hawkeyes at Kinnick Stadium. Michigan State beat Iowa 26-14. / Reese Strickland-USA TODAY Sports

Generally, itís easy to tell the difference between a football school and a basketball school. Kentucky is synonymous with college basketball and Alabama lives and dies with itís football program. Itís that simple.

Not for Michigan State.

For the Spartans it has never been that clear-cut, but since Tom Izzo took over the basketball program it has garnered much more national attention than the football programĖat least until the last few years.

Izzo has brought the team to six Final Fourís and won a National Championship, giving Michigan State the reputation around the country as a basketball school.

Not so fast.

Mark Dantonio has built up the Spartan football program to the point where itís impossible to call Michigan State anything other than a football school. In just seven years as head coach Dantonio already has the fourth most wins in school history (64), and the Spartans 42 wins since 2010 are the most in the B1G and ninth most in the NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision over that stretch.

Not only has Dantonio won consistently, but he has won the important games. MSUís 35 conference victories since 2008 are the most of any team in the conference and itís current three game bowl winning streak is the longest in school history.

Most important, though, Dantonio has transformed Michigan from MSUís ďBig BrotherĒ into itís ďLittle SisterĒ by beating the Wolverines five out of the last six seasons. There is nothing Michigan State students love more than having a year of bragging rights over their friends in maize and blue, and Dantonio has given them that more than Tom Izzo in recent years. Over the past four seasons the MSU Football team is 3-1 against UM while the basketball team is a paltry 3-6.

The importance of beating Michigan really canít be overstated. Each time Michigan State notches a win over UM it not only gives Spartan fans bragging rights, but it also provides the Spartans with a win over one of the most storied college football programs in the country. Now thatís how you win over a university.

Although Michigan State isnít one of the blue-blood college football programs, it has won marquee games in recent years which has boosted itís national recognition. The victory over top-five ranked Wisconsin in 2011 was seen by millions on ESPN, and it showed them not only how talented the team was, but also how passionate the fan base is. College football fans have gotten to see a lot more of Michigan State since then with the Spartans appearing in two B1G Championship Games as well as the Rose Bowl this past January.

This upcoming season Michigan State has five night games already on itís schedule, more than twice the normal amount. For the most part, the night games will be televised nationally on ABC or ESPN giving the Spartans their most national exposure in a long time. This came largely due to the success Michigan State had last season, but it is also partly because Michigan State is becoming a team that people all around the country want to watch.

Michigan State is starting to build a fan base that extends outside of those with direct ties to the university, which has caused students and other MSU fans to become even more involved with the football program. Just today while in Arlington Heights, Illinois I had someone exclaim ďGo Green!Ē to me when they saw I was wearing a Michigan State Rose Bowl hat. The Spartan family is expanding due in large part to Mark Dantonio and what he has done with the football program.

Students are becoming more in tune with the football team even if they have little interest in the sport itself because all they hear about around campus is chatter about the team. Itís nearly impossible to find someone around the Michigan State campus on a Monday morning in the fall who doesnít know or doesnít care how the football team played that weekend. After a big win Monday morning lectures are usually started with the professor asking, ďSo how Ďbout that game Saturday?Ē with a proud grin on his or her face; and following losses there is a melancholy cloud over campus that lingers until the Spartans kick off their next game.

There was no better illustration of the passion and dedication of the Spartan fan base than the turnout at the 2014 Rose Bowl. Although East Lansing is about six times further from Pasadena than Stanfordís campus, the Rose Bowl was dominated by green and white. Those Spartan fans had been waiting a quarter century for MSU to return to Pasadena, and they showed their support by flocking from all over the country to see their beloved Spartans compete in the ďGranddaddy of them allĒ.

This is not to say that Spartan fans donít support the basketball team; the Izzone is one of the best student sections in the country and there are few places harder to play than the Breslin Center. The basketball team hasnít completely fallen off the face of the earth the past few years either; it has won the B1G Tournament two of the last three years.

Tom Izzo is one of the greatest coaches in Michigan State history and he has sustained success for two decades, but the fact of the matter is that the basketball team has failed to do two crucial things the past few years: beat Michigan and make the Final Four.

Michigan State will probably never turn into Alabama where football rules and basketball is an afterthought, but there is a definite culture change going on in East Lansing. If Izzo brings the basketball team back to a couple Final Fourís things could change, but for now Michigan State is owned by Mark Dantonio and the football team.